I hope someone here can give me a light.

Tonight I went photograph and film a floating Christmas tree (world's tallest, according to Guinness).  Film was done with my Powershot A620, no pro output intended.  The lighting on the tree cycles every 3 1/2 min, more or less, and I filmed the whole sequence, resulting in a 355MB file, according to the camera.  When I transfer the file to the computer, it arrives zeroed and, of course, it doesn't play.  

The video plays in the camera, so it is not like I have a faulty media.  The problem is when I save it to the computer.  I even saved a trimmed version (cut a few seconds) and the same happens.

Is there anything like a maximum file size the computer can handle?  I'm using Win XP Home, if it matters, and the camera saves in AVI.

Is there anything like a maximum file size the computer can handle?  I'm using Win XP Home, if it matters, and the camera saves in AVI.

Windows XP uses FAT32 file system, I believe the maximum file size is 4 GB.
How do you transfer the file?
I would try another method (card reader or a USB cable). One of them might be faulty.

I try to view it with Windows Movie Player, but that isn't the issue because the file is zeroed, as seen in My Documents.

It's not a time thing, because there is another video that is 3:18 long (the faulty one is 3:17), but as it was shot later in the night, the sky is dark and therefore the file is smaller (216MB) because of less information.

I transfered throuh the camera cable.  I'll try to save it directly from the card to my Jobo disk.

Hmm.  Putting the card in my Jobo reader HD and connecting it to the computer, I was able to succesfully copy (and run) the file.  I didn't even save it to the Jobo.

Now can anyone give me an explanation to this?

Jobo is an external HD with card reader, so it transfer card contents to its HD or, if attached to a computer, it transforms each card in a driver.  That's what I did, transferring the video in the "F" driver (the memory card) to my computer's HD, without using Jobo's HD.  No software is required, it works like any media storage device in a USB port, only that it's many devices in one USB connection.

I did wait enough. In the first attempt, I copied all files from the camera, and when I do that I go do something else while the camera and computer are working.  In the following attempts, I only transfered this file and the resaved version of it, which both failed.

I did wait enough. In the first attempt, I copied all files from the camera, and when I do that I go do something else while the camera and computer are working.  In the following attempts, I only transfered this file and the resaved version of it, which both failed.

Computers and cameras work in mysterious ways. (like that's news?)

Whatever the reason, USB, partly corrupted file, the Great Fuzzy Wuzzy Wasn't,  it's a 0 file because it's being written to the directory, but the full file information, isn't getting there.

At least you found a way to rescue it! I have always preferred card readers over camera connections.

It has nothing to do with FAT32 copied to NTFS, because those are just the way the information about the files is stored, and how it's on the drive. In Windows XP, the maximum partition size that can be created using FAT32 is 32GB. You can convert Fat32 information to NTFS, but not the other way, without re-formatting the drive. After 8GB FAT32 partition size can have some problems. (there are patches and work arounds, but the above is a generalization of the normal working of FAT32)

Maximum files size if 4GB on Fat32. You are under that if your number is 355MB.

NTFS has permissions and is more secure.

None of this is any help to you is my guess, unless the problem has to do with the file folder you were trying to copy to?